


Lost

by MajorWolfe



Category: Holby City
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-07
Updated: 2017-04-07
Packaged: 2018-10-16 02:35:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10561966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MajorWolfe/pseuds/MajorWolfe
Summary: After Serena leaves, Bernie is disappointed to find that, not only has she lost her girlfriend, but also the lighter she's had for over half her life.A random oneshot set after 'It's Only Love If It Hurts'





	

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure where this idea came from but it wouldn't leave me alone until I'd written it. A oneshot for now but I might write a longer 'something' about how Bernie copes with Serena's abscence in the future.

“Everything okay?” Fletch asked, swearing he heard Bernie growl as she slammed a drawer on the nurses’ station closed, the third drawer he’d seen her rummage through in the past 10 minutes.

Bernie looked up, “don’t suppose you’ve seen my lighter have you?”

“Sorry” he shook his head, “when did you last have it?”

Bernie shrugged, she’d tried to remember that herself but her mind kept drawing a blank, she had no idea when she’d last seen the battered piece of metal, “dunno, I’ve probably left it at home” she said, picking up a pile of patient notes and making her way into the office.

She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair as she sat down, tugging her blonde locks free of the elastic band she’d tied them in several hours ago as her eyes were drawn to the empty desk opposite her own, in the grand scheme of things, she supposed her lighter was insignificant compared to what else she’d lost in the past few days. “Maybe it’s a sign” she mumbled to herself as she took a box of cigarettes from the top drawer of her desk, tapping them gently against the edge, maybe losing the lighter she’d had for over half her life was a sign to stop the habit she’d had for several years longer than that. She shrugged and dropped the cigarettes back into the drawer, maybe.

She briefly considered ordering herself a new lighter online, sure she could get something similar to her original one but quickly decided she couldn’t be bothered, it might look the same but it wouldn’t be the same.  She’d bought the lighter in the weeks before she started her basic training, her initials engraved in the bottom right corner of the metal.  It had been scratched and dinted from spending months, years in her pack, in her pocket as she traveled between warzones and base camps, loyally serving with her, deployment after deployment.  It had lit hundreds, if not thousands, of cigarettes, the birthday candles on her children’s cakes, there were a few occasions when she’d had no other choice but to use the flame to sterilize make shift medical equipment and it had even been in her pocket when she’d been blown up. She’d never tell anyone but that lighter probably held more sentimental value to Bernie than anything else she owned, and now it was gone.  She lifted her eyes to Serena’s desk again and shook her head, she’d forget all about the lighter in a heartbeat if it would bring Serena back.

Bernie cursed when, after a long shift, she pulled her cigarettes from her handbag, spending a minute scrabbling for her lighter before she remembered, rolling her eyes and dropping the packet back into her bag, making a mental note to pick up a lighter or a box of matches on her way home.

She ended up with a packet of 10 lighters, all brightly coloured, transparent plastic.  She pulled the blue one from the packet first, the colour reminding her not only of her trauma scrubs, but of a shirt Serena owned, if she closed her eyes Bernie could almost feel the thin fabric beneath her fingers, could almost smell the fabric conditioner Serena always poured generously into her washing machine. The plastic felt foreign in her hands as she stood outside the shop, flicking her thumb over the top of the lighter, frowning and shaking it slightly when it failed to light.  It didn’t feel right but it lit her cigarette the same way ‘her’ lighter always had, and that was the most important thing Bernie told herself as she took a long drag of her cigarette and dropped the lighter into her bag.

Blue didn’t last long, just a week before Bernie could no longer find it, lost to the depths of her handbag, or left on a bench in the peace gardens or something, she couldn’t remember.  The purple one didn’t fare well either, slipping from her hands just two days after she’d taken it from the packet, cracking against the corner of a concrete ledge on the roof before shattering by her feet.  Yellow and green were next to disappear, quickly followed by pink and a second green lighter, it reached the point where she was losing lighters so frequently that Fletch had stashed an emergency box of matches in the staff room on AAU for her.

She flicked her newest lighter onto her desk, this one opaque and white, she’d had it for almost a month, a record when she’d spent the previous five getting through several lighters a week.  She shrugged off her coat, hanging it over her chair and dropping her bag to the floor, kicking it under her desk.  As always she glanced at Serena’s desk, hoping it wouldn’t be long before the brunette would be there to greet her each morning.

Her eyes flickered to her own desk and she felt her heart stop, her battered lighter sat on top of a post it note, two words scribbled on the yellow paper in a familiar script, _‘thank you’._

Bernie glanced around the room, how had she not noticed, the lights being on when she entered had been put down to the cleaners or the on call consultant from the night shift, but the black coat hanging on the coat rack, the handbag on the floor beneath the coat. “Fuck” Bernie whispered, racing from the office, not caring about the noise as she flung the door open, her heart beginning to pound in her chest as she heard a laugh that she once thought she’d never hear again, and, as she rounded the corner, she saw her, Serena, leaning against the nurses’ station talking to Fletch.  He said something Bernie didn't hear before gesturing behind Serena, obviously letting her know Bernie was there.

“Well” Serena smiled as she stood, turning to face Bernie, “aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?”

Bernie said nothing, not caring who was watching as she all but sprinted over, wrapping her arms around Serena and pulling her close, inhaling her scent and kissing her forehead, “Serena” she whispered, over and over, unaware she was crying until she felt Serena wipe at the tears rolling down her cheeks.

“You’re okay” Serena told her, “it’s okay, I’m back Darling, I’m home and I won’t ever leave you again.”


End file.
